1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to an isolated silicon controlled rectifier (SCR) electro-static discharge (ESD) device; particularly, it relates to an isolated SCR ESD device which prevents a negative voltage from adversely impacting a circuit.
2. Description of Related Art
ESD devices are used in many integrated circuits to discharge high voltage received by external pins before the high voltage damages internal devices. One type of ESD devices uses an SCR. FIG. 1 shows such a conventional SCR ESD device, which includes: an N-type well 11 and a P-type well 21 located in a P-type substrate 100, a high density P+ doped region 13 and a high density N+ doped region 15 located in the N-type well 11, and a high density P+ doped region 23 and a high density N+ doped region 25 located in the P-type well 21. In this SCR ESD device, the P+ doped region 13, the N+ doped region 15, the N-type well 11, and the P-type well 21 constitute a PNP transistor; the N-type well 11, the P-type well 21, and the N+ doped region 25 constitute an NPN transistor. An external pad PAD is coupled to the P+ doped region 13 and the N+ doped region 15, and, an external grounding pad GND is coupled to the P+ doped region 23 and the N+ doped region 25. Therefore, when the external pad PAD receives a high voltage, the SCR ESD device is triggered to conduct a current to the grounding pad GND.
The abovementioned prior art has the following shortcoming. When the external pad PAD receives a negative voltage, a junction diode formed by the high density N+ doped region 15, the N-type well 11, and the P-type substrate 100 will be forward biased and turned on, resulting in a current loss from the substrate 100 to the external pad PAD. The current loss consumes power, and furthermore it may create a latch-up effect, causing malfunctions of internal circuit devices. In general ESD design, it is not expected that a negative voltage will be applied to the external pad PAD. However, when the circuit is used to drive power transistor switches, a transient negative voltage may be applied to the external pad PAD due to the switching ringing of the power transistor switches.
In view of the foregoing, the present invention provides an isolated SCR ESD device, which can avoid the adverse impact on a circuit caused by a negative voltage.